Book 4: May Showers
by ReverendKilljoy
Summary: Work-in-progress... Short (I hope!) story to unite the focal pairings of my Post-Chosen trilogy (The Key and the Carpenter; The Sword and the Fist; The Night and the Day). A little melancholy but with some romance too. Sucker for romance. Remember: Specific feedback is the pearl of great price.
1. I: Into Each Life Some Rain Must Fall

_Introduction and Disclaimer: A story which I hope will feature my pairings from my previous Buffy stories (Robin/Faith, Xander/Dawn, Buffy/Riley) with guest appearances by Willow/Kennedy and a celebrity guest to be revealed nearer to the end bit. Or not. Still writing it. Allons-y._

 _ **Prologue**_

"I'm Shirley Yang, and this is Action News at 9. Thank you for tuning in, our top story tonight: Rain. After four and a half years of record drought, the rains have returned at last. We are seeing sustained rains across our viewing area, with more precipitation predicted through the weekend."

She turned slightly as the 2-Camera picked up the shot, smoothly keeping eye contact with her audience. The outside shot graphic superimposed behind her showed a steady shower, dropping and dripping and gusting slightly in the evening breeze. Here and there the moon shown down through gaps in the clouds, making columns of silver against the night.

"While amateur gardeners may cheer, Scott Pankonin in Weather Center 12 tells us we might want to hold our applause. But first, the California Republican Party Primaries continued to surprise today, as Los Angeles City Councilman Lindsey McDonald continues to pick up steam in the race for Governor…"

 **Buffy the Vampire Slayer: May Showers**

 **by Reverend Killjoy**

 **I. Into Each Life, Some Rain Must Fall**

Robin Wood sat, his long legs folded into lotus, his hands loosely clasped in his lap. He sat on mat of rushes, before an altar of the Buddha. He appeared at peace, Zen, to be dwelling in the place reached through that struggle for the place that cannot be reached through struggle.

He was not at peace. His body was still, but his heart was heavy, his mind racing. Master Chen, the ancient practitioner who had introduced him into the ways of meditation many years ago would not have been impressed.

Just before her hand touched his shoulder, he felt Faith, the Vampire Slayer, slide up next to him. More precisely, he felt the air parting before her fingertips. Of her arrival, he had felt or heard no trace at all. She'd been practicing.

"Hey."

Her voice was soft, shockingly so to those who had only known her in the past. Lately, her voice had been softer, kinder. It didn't help, between them, but it didn't make things worse either. She slowly folded, coming to her knees beside him, her fingertips lightly touching his shoulder. He smelled, now, her shampoo, and the citrusy soap that she scrubbed with after a hard workout.

"You didn't come to bed."

It sounded like a statement. It could have been a question. It felt like an accusation.

"Not sleepy," he lied. It was easier than explaining that his body was tired but his mind refused to listen. It was the kind of lie he'd been telling a lot lately.

"I could fix that, maybe, if you came to bed," she said, with just a hint of a purr at the beginning, which trailed into a flat expressionless statement by the end. She still tried, but it was difficult for her, too.

He rose, swiftly but not suddenly, and she followed. He turned at last and looked at her, her dark beauty glowing in the night, calling to him, tightening the muscles in his chest slightly as she always had. For a moment, no. No, he'd listened to that impulse before.

"Going for a walk," he said. "Just for a bit. You go on to bed."

Neither could hold the other's gaze. He slipped his feet into a pair of soft shoes and threw a long duster coat over his shoulders. She turned, looking out the window, at the gentle rain drifting down through the hazy night of Anaheim, the shops signs, streetlights, and apartment TVs glowing through it all in a fairy haze. She didn't watch him leave, but she didn't go to bed either.

Outside, Wood's feet quickly became wet through his shoes, and his bald head gleamed darkly with beaded water like dew on a mahogany stump. After he'd walked maybe 60 yards, he shook himself like an animal, and water flew away in tiny arcs around him.

"Damn, Wood." His voice sounded only in his head, but he heard it clearly and persuasively. "What are you doing?"

He looked around at the rain-spattered street corner, the water dripping off of eaves and awnings in irregular fountains down the block. There was nothing. No danger, no threat, no allure. Just rain, and streets, and a 60-yard, squelching walk in wet shoes back to the apartment over the dojo, back to his bed, and back to his wife. He turned, and began the walk home.


	2. II: Raining in My Heart

**II. Raining in My Heart**

"Don't just stand there, looking at me like that," Buffy Summers groused. Her hair was unevenly pulled back under a bandana, and she had flour smeared across one cheek. Baking day was not going as planned, as evidenced by a wastebasket filled with over- and under-done cookies. She had put her fists on her hips exasperatedly, and now was mad at herself for the mess she was making of her jeans from the batter on her hands.

Riley Finn, a cookie held in one of his massive hands, stood calmly under the acid of her demeanor, slowly chewing on a bite of the latest batch. The scar tissue that covered his throat and reached pale fingers towards his chin pulled and flexed as he chewed. And chewed.

"I know!" she finally exploded, sweeping the latest batch of cookies in the general direction of the wastebasket. "These aren't right either."

He chewed.

"You don't have to keeping chewing," she relented, "You're not a cow."

With patience and effort, he swallowed the bite, then looked thoughtfully at the cookie he still held. He tilted his head as he regarded the irregular confection.

"Not your worst effort," he said encouragingly, his raspy voice still a surprising reminder of the damage he had suffered in Panama, every time she heard him speak. "Cookie dough is tricky."

In irritation, she grabbed too quickly for a stout spoon sticking out of a mixing bowl, and the heavy metal handle bent and warped in her slayer-strong grip. She held up the twisted spoon in shock, tears threatening her eyes, and watched a half-unmixed glob of flour and dough drop to the floor. She dropped the spoon on the counter, swiped the bandana from her head, and headed to the sink. She turned her back to Riley, and began scrubbing her hands under the warm water. She wanted to eliminate all evidence of baking.

Riley picked up the spoon, and only slightly relying on his great height and superior mass, levered it against the counter. He watched it slowly straighten into more-or-less a spoon shape, then, set it aside. He moved behind his much-shorter girlfriend and reached around her, rinsing off his own hands as he brushed his lips across the top of her head.

"It's okay," he breathed softly. "It's only cookies."

She leaned back, enjoying for a moment the comforting solidity of his body around hers. She closed her eyes and relaxed, letting him slowly clean all the flour and other cookie remnants from her hands. His hands were large, calloused from physical work, but precise, controlled. As his hands washed hers, his thumbs began to trace along her wrists, an unspoken offer.

"And that's enough of that," she said suddenly, twisting and ducking away from him and heading out of the kitchen.

He turned off the water and followed her, across the open loft. Not towards the stairs up to the bed, nor to the couch, but towards the door. He didn't need to ask if she was going. He knew well what it felt like, by now, to be walked out on by Buffy Summers. He stopped following.

"It's not just cookies, you see," she said, throwing a scarf around her neck as she opened the door. The rain was falling again, a blue-gray veil across the afternoon. "It's a metaphor. I'm the cookie dough. It's metaphor-y. Never mind. I love you."

She closed the door on his response, and kicked at puddles as she walked. It wasn't his fault, at all, and both of them knowing that was starting to get to her. There was nothing really wrong, just a weird vibe the last few days, since the heavy gun-metal clouds settled over southern California, since the rain started.

Inside his condo, Riley stood by the window, watching the drops form and race down the windowpane, to be lost, then to be replaced as new drops formed and slid down after. He placed his hand on the glass, watching the water and thinking of other times, of another place, of rain showers in Panama with Sam before she died. He didn't _not_ think of Sam much, but it had been a while since the old melancholy hit him like this.

He wanted a drink.

As Buffy turned the corner, a tiny figure lost in the rain, he wondered if he was going to go to bed, to a meeting, or to a bar. Instead, he stood at the window until even the wary sunshine was gone, and the light from the kitchen turned the window into a mirror. He looked at his own face, lined and wise before his time, and closed the curtains. He turned off the lights, left the mess for tomorrow, and went to bed.

It had been four days he had asked her to move in with him, and she had told him, "No."

 _More forthcoming._

— _Killjoy_


	3. III: Singing in the Rain

III. _Singin_ _g_ _in the Rain_

"Xander? How long have you been sitting out here?"

Dawn's voice was soft, but annoyed. The baby on her hip was sleeping, at last, and she had just discovered her husband sitting in his work truck, in the driveway, bemusedly watching the rain.

"I'm sorry, guys," Xander said, trying to pull himself together. "I was thinking about something and lost track of time."

He gathered his briefcase, a roll of plans, and a large water bottle, which left him a hand short and juggling as he headed towards the door of the house. Rain spiraled and arced off the roof of the carport, and he rushed across the gap between carport and house. In just those few steps his head, his briefcase, and his carefully rolled plans were well dampened.

Dawn followed, Hope snuggled in her blanket and more or less secure from the rain. As they reached the front door, the rain let up suddenly.

"Is that not-rain that I don't hear?" Xander pitched his belongings through the door, and stood back outside to regard the gray skies.

"It's almost not-rain, I think." Dawn squinted into the clouds, measuring the large gaps between drops. "I think you should grab the stroller. We might be able to squeeze a walk in if we hurry."

Ten minutes–that should have been five–later, the Harrises were walking through their suburban neighborhood, Xander pushing Hope's stroller while Dawn kicked ideally at the larger puddles, her red ladybug rain boots lifting brown and gray water in looping splashes around them. Dawn was mumbling some song softly, accenting the end of each chorus with a slightly wetter splash. Xander was content to watch her from a few paces back, steering the stroller through the smaller puddles and around the larger ones where possible, as the light rain drizzled down.

He watched Dawn, so proud and amazed still that he was hers, and she was his. She spun a little, her raincoat flaring like a tango artist's gown, and he saw where her calves fit into her rain boots, a little swell of muscle on her slender frame. It was nothing, a brief glimpse of denim under her bright yellow raincoat, but it struck him like a blow.

"You know, if the little monkey's going to stay down a while, we could…" His voice trailed off hopefully. When she turned, his dark brown eye was regarding her with open desire, his mouth in that bashful half-grin that he got whenever he looked at her that way.

"Xander?"

"Yes?"

"Why are we still out here? Get back to the house."

Of course, Hope awoke as soon as they returned to the house, as with a flash and a crash the rain picked up again in earnest. It was hours later that they finally found their own bed, the evening rushing towards night and the sound of rain wrapping the house into a cocoon of isolation, cutting them off from the rest of the world outside their walls.

Xander, as was his self-appointed duty, made sure that Hope was truly down for the night before he came to bed himself. He found Dawn, a book forgotten in her arms, asleep with the light on where she had waited for him. He took the book and set it aside, and kissed her on her forehead. He removed his eye-patch, and as he hung it from the bedpost, he slipped his wedding ring through the strap so it would hang over him as he slept.

At some point in the night, he woke as Dawn slipped into bed, back from checking on the baby. He reached a broad arm over to pull her close, and was surprised to find she was undressed. As they moved together in the night, each thought how wonderful it was that they had found one another, and how well they fit together in so many meanings of the phrase. At last, they fell asleep, listening to one another breathing, to the small noises of the baby on the baby monitor, and the rain, the rain falling against roof and window.

 _More forthcoming._

— _Killjoy_


End file.
